NEVER Select a Use Case Based on BUSINESS VALUE (BV)! There are 9 Other Key Considerations.

If you're a business leader, manager, analyst, engineer or in product development, you serve multiple stakeholders with competing priorities, selecting a use case based on BV is trouble, read why!

First and foremost, lets define Business Value in it’s most simplest terms.

Business Value is the tangible and intangible benefits that a company realizes to its overall profitability and success. This can include: increased revenue, cost savings, market share growth, customer satisfaction, brand reputation, increased NPS scores, consumer acquisition, and more.

However, just like ‘Beauty’ is in the eye of the beholder, ‘Business Value’ is in the eye of the stakeholder. What is of business value to one business leader may not be business value to another . For example:

• Whats important to the head of manufacturing is different than supply chain

• The goals of a regional president in North America is different than China

• One function may be focused on growth, while another function on efficiency

• One business unit prioritizes market expansion, another on consumer loyalty

The list goes on!

Due to the diversity of stakeholders we serve, their competing strategic priorities, how they get compensated end of year, and personal agendas, its nearly impossible to please all and pick use cases based on Business Value alone.

You’re setting yourself up!

So how should you select use cases? Complexity & Criticality. You need to establish a measure for how complex the deployment will be. You need to establish a measure for how critical the use case is to the longevity of the company. Consider the following:

Complexity:

1. Stakeholder Involvement - is the person you’re doing the work for a good partner? Will they be engaged & involved? Will they have regular meetings with you and your team? Will they give you the active support when needed?

2. Resource Availability - will the resources you need be available to help or are they being pulled into too many directions? Will scheduling meetings to align on direction & decisions be difficult to attain?

3. Data Accessibility & Integrity - is the data you need for this use case available, accessible, and of relatively good quality? Last thing you need is to take on a data project while delivering a use case.

4. Dependency on other Functions - do you have dependencies on other small teams, functions, and groups that are hard to work with? Have low attention spans? Move at a different pace than you?

5. Infrastructure - do you have the basic infrastructure to do the work or do you need to put that in place?

Go through each of your use cases and answer the following 5 questions. Rate them. Why? Because your success is judged based on both value AND deliver excellence (on time, on budget, and with business outcomes). Your feasibility to deploy and ability to deliver is just as important as the value you will bring. So reduce (if you can’t remove) as much of the barriers to success as possible.

Criticality:

1. Competitive Threat - take a look at competitive threat, from both incumbent and bespoke businesses that are fast approaching. Which of your use cases strengthens your market position and posture?

2. Market Consolidation - which markets and distribution channels are consolidating versus expanding. which of your use cases supports these channel strategies?

3. Government Regulations & Fines - government regulations, data privacy laws, and federal/state/local acts are being established with fines and penalties if not followed. Which of your use cases has a financial implication if not delivered?

4. Exposure & Press - in today’s social media culture, everyone has an equal voice. Take a look at your use cases and see if any of them can be provocative in nature or debated in public?

5. Business Value - Establish which use case focuses on increased revenue, cost savings, market share growth, customer satisfaction, brand reputation, NPS score, customer acquisition, and see how it aligns with the companies strategic priorities, not just the business leaders.

Go through each use case and answer the following 5 questions. Rate them. Why? Because when you have to define value, you want to make sure you’re not isolating leaders, getting involved with politics, and taking into consideration the macro-landscape, in addition to the mico-landscape to position yourself as an objective & fair thought leader.